


heart of iron

by Areiton



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Character Study, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Grieving, Heart of Iron movie, M/M, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Protective Pepper Potts, Spider-Man: Far From Home (Movie), sorta - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-04
Updated: 2019-07-04
Packaged: 2020-06-09 14:43:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19478044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Areiton/pseuds/Areiton
Summary: The world was waiting for the authorized movie, the one Tony’s remaining family endorsed and supported. They were waiting for the biography, for the story of a man who saved them all, and Peterhatedthem for that.Tony was theirs. Not the whole damn world--he’d given enough and he deserved to rest, to be given in death what he never had in life--privacy.





	heart of iron

**Author's Note:**

> I saw that damn in-flight movie on Spider-Man: Far From Home and I had opinions and feels. Enjoy?

Pepper calls him, is how it starts. 

Pepper calls him often enough that when the phone rings, he doesn’t flinch away from it the way he did in the days right after the Blip, doesn’t turn it to silent and hide in his blankets. That stopped when she showed up at his apartment--the new one, the one that didn’t feel like home to him or May, the one that SI was paying for and he felt guilty walking into, the one Tony would never visit--

She shows up and says, gently, “Take your time.” 

She says, carefully, “He loved you so much.” 

She says, pleading, “Morgan can’t wait to meet you.” 

And it’s that--the utter sincerity and the _truth_ behind her words--that drags him from his grief and his hiding, back to a house on a lake that he loathes, to a little girl with a tremulous smile and tear stained cheeks and her father’s wit. 

He comes back to life, for Pepper, for May, for _Morgan._

Pepper calls him, and it’s not unusual. 

“We’ve been approached by a producer,” she says, and that _is._

Peter sighs and leans his head back on the mountain of pillows, and says, “That’s what, the third one?” 

“Fourth,” she corrects, and he huffs. 

She says its normal, expected even. He thinks it's inappropriate, far too soon. 

May says the world is mourning too, and Peter would care about that more, maybe, if Tony weren't dead. 

So producers come and pitch their movies and they decided early--Pepper and Rhodey and Peter and Harley--that they'd agee to do it together, or not at all. 

So far, it had been not at all. 

The first was a biopic that Pepper and Rhodey dismissed after reading five pages of the screenplay. The second was about the Avengers, about the Civil War and Peter threw up reading it, reading what they _thought_ of Tony. 

The third Pepper threw the legal team at, and they were still fighting the cease and desist. They’d make it, Pepper said, even if they had to change the names. 

The world was waiting for the authorized movie, the one Tony’s remaining family endorsed and supported. They were waiting for the biography, for the story of a man who saved them all, and Peter _hated_ them for that. 

Tony was theirs. Not the whole damn world--he’d given enough and he deserved to rest, to be given in death what he never had in life--privacy. 

“What is it?” he asks, and on the other end of the phone, Pepper pauses. It makes his gut churn, anxiously. 

“Sweetheart, I think you should come in and listen to what they have to say.” 

~*~ 

He doesn’t talk during the meeting. The movie-- _Heart of Iron--_ is a documentary. The directors don’t talk at first, just smile, nervous, at Peter and the others and turn on the laptop. 

Tony fills up the screen, and Peter bites back a hurt noise, clings to Harley’s hand where it clenches on his. 

The footage is grainy and the camera shakes, but it’s Tony, in a small desert town. He systematically destroys the weapons stockpiled there, and disables each of the hostiles holding the villagers at gunpoint, and Rhodey laughs,a tiny noise, when Tony punches through a wall and drags a screaming terrorist into the open. He leaves the man there, surrounded by his victims, as he blasts into the sky. 

The scene is replaced by a boy, a few years older than Peter. He looks ancient. “Ironman saved us, that day. He didn’t just keep us from being killed--he gave us back our dignity, by giving us the choice to punish those who hurt us.” 

Off camera: “Did you lose someone?” 

“No. He saved my father. He saved us all.” 

“What do you say to those who claim he can’t outweigh the deaths his weapons caused?” 

“If you save one life, and save the world--what do you do when you save a hundred lives? What do you save, if you save a thousand? Show me the lives he took, and I will show you the lives he saved.” 

It goes on. And on. And on. Shakey cell phone footage of Tony saving lives. Survivors recounting their experiences. 

It’s a tribute. Not like the first three project which all felt exploitative and invasive. This feels genuine. An honor. 

“The film,” the producer, a man named James, says, when the film has ended, “will chronicle all of Mr. Stark’s life as Ironman. His successes and failures and why he turned those into successes. But we’d like to include the people who mattered most to him. That’s you.” He pauses. “We aren’t--I know that you’ve been approached by other projects. This isn’t like that. We’re not trying to entertain. We’re trying to honor a man who _deserves_ to be honored.” 

“And if we say no?” Peter asks. “If we say this doesn’t belong to the general public--what will you do?” 

James hesitates, his gaze flicking over Pepper and when she waves a hand at Peter, he focuses on the boy. “We respect that. We’ll make the film without you’re blessing and do everything in our power to honor him. But--Tony might not belong to the general public. But Tony Stark? He does. He always has. He made himself our hero. And I think--” 

Peter tenses. 

“Maybe the world doesn’t deserve him,” James says, softly. “But he gave himself to us, anyway. I want them to know who he was, not the shadow that Hollywood and the tabloids created.” 

~*~ 

Peter sits in his room in the dark. 

They talked, after James left, but Pepper had put the final decision off. “They want to do it,” he says, softly. Dully. 

Harley shifts, curls closer around him, pressing against Peter’s back, lips arm against his skin. “Yeah.” 

“And you do.” 

Harley kisses him, and doesn’t answer. 

“Why don’t you?” he asks, finally, gently. 

Because he wasn’t the world’s. 

He was _ours._

“The world took so much from him. And he gave them _everything.”_

“He didn’t,” Harley says. 

Peter twists, peers through the darkness at this beautiful boy he never expected. 

Tony was still giving him the best gifts he could never ask for, even in death. 

“Tony didn’t give everything to save the world, baby. He did it for Morgan. For me and you and Pep. He was selfish--he only risked himself when he knew he could save you and me. Not the whole fucking world. He didn’t care about them. They were a happy byproduct-- _I_ was, if we’re honest. Tony tore the universe apart and died to bring you back, to keep you and Pepper and Rhodey safe on that battlefield.” 

Peter blinks, tears burning in his eyes and Harley shifts, coming up to straddle him, thumbs carefully brushing away his tears. “That’s what the world will never know. What they don’t deserve, what they can’t earn. That’s _our_ Tony. Ironman, though? He always belonged to the world. Let them have _Ironman._ We have _Tony.”_

~*~ 

He agrees. 

He doesn’t want to, hesitates about it. He can see in Pepper’s eyes she thinks he’ll balk. But he agrees. 

~*~ 

He sits in an uncomfortable chair, and the camera is big and unavoidable, the lights too hot against his skin. 

A disembodied voice asks, “What did Tony Stark mean to you?” 

Peter hesitates. 

And then he smiles, and says, “Everything. He meant everything.” 

**Author's Note:**

> Come visit me on [Tumblr](http://www.areiton.tumblr.com)


End file.
